Little Bluestem

We have 5 acres, but only use about a fourth of it for our gardening activities.  The rest of it, that which is not taken up by a few large trees, our house and outbuildings, is open grassland.  I like to call this part our "wildflower meadow" because in the spring there are a lot of wildflowers out there.  A couple of years ago, I wrote an entry about some of these.

Windy Acres Wildflowers

As mentioned in the above blog entry, we only mow these grassy areas a couple of times a year.  During the middle to late part of the summer, the wildflowers are gone and many of the spring grasses have died  At that time, it becomes rather unsightly and it is time to mow.  I've suggested getting some goats and letting them mow for us, but Tom has not taken the bait so far.  

Anyhow, this year we divide up the mowing duties.  Tom mowed the large open area to the west of the house and I mowed the area between the house and the road.  As I was mowing, I noticed some tall clumps of bluish colored grasses that I decided to leave.  I just liked the way they looked.

Tom told me these grasses were Little Bluestem.  Having now done some quick Google searches on this grass, here's what I have found.  It is a native grass to North America.  It is a perennial bunch grass and is one of the prominent grasses in the Tall Grass Prairie, an ecosystem native to central North America.  

Little Bluestem grows to a typical height of 3 feet.  It is called "bluestem" because, in the spring, it has a bluish hue.  Even though it is currently late summer,  I found this one clump that still has this blue coloring.

Most of the grass is turning tan, like this.

 The seeds are tiny.  They form on the top 6 inches or so of the stem.

I hope that, by leaving the clumps of Little Bluestem when I mowed, they will produce lots of seed that will germinate next spring and produce more clumps of this pretty grass for me to mow around.